Description of Thai as an isolating language

Bibliographic Data

ID3074953
AuthorsMakoto Minegishi (Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, corresponding author)
Year2011
Volume50
Issue1
Pages62-80
Publication date2011-03-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSocial Science Information (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0539-0184 • E-ISSN: 1461-7412
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/0539018410389107
OpenAlexW2029142318
LanguageEN
Citations received3
References cited11

The article illustrates morphosyntactic characteristics of Thai, an isolating language, in contrast to the modern European languages. Thai is characterized as a topic-prominent language, where the voluntary-spontaneous contrast rather than transitive-intransitive one plays significant roles in forming basic sentence constructions. By assuming non-hierarchical serial verb constructions as its basic sentence structures, the author claims that the modern hierarchical view of language structure is not appropriate for Thai. In Thai, verbs are serialized to denote not only successive actions or an action and its objective, but also a cause and its result, an action and its evaluation. Furthermore, causative and passive constructions are analyzed as part of verb serializations which are structurally identical, but antiparallel to each other in the direction of affectedness

Causative · Linguistics · Physics · Sentence · Transitive relation · Verb · Computer Science · Linguistic Variation and Morphology · Mathematics · Multilingual Education and Policy · Philosophy · Psychology · Translation Studies and Practices · Artificial Intelligence

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